Israel Matzav

Kristallnacht and the consequences of hatred

My friend and former neighbor Hanoch Teller sent me a link to an article that he wrote this past week on the 68th anniversary of Kristallnacht. It hits the nail on the head:

The Nazis attempted to portray Kristallnacht as a spontaneous eruption of German hatred for the Jews. Alas, nothing happens overnight; hatred festers, it doesn’t metastasize.

The Nazis assiduously educated their populace (drawing upon a copious history and tradition) regarding the supposed danger posed by the Jews. The outcome of this education was the greatest and most appalling genocide in history.

Over half-a-century later this is precisely what is so terrifying about the instruction conducted in the Palestinian Authority and the Hizbolla educational network. Hatred of the Jews is taught in schools and preached in the mosques. Cartoons and articles in newspapers routinely portray Jews in blatantly anti-Semitic terms, mirroring Der Sturmer.

All of the Arab media are harnessed toward this goal as if Dr. Joeseph Goebbels, Hitler’s Minister of Propaganda, were orchestrating the campaign. Palestinian and Hizbolla Television broadcasts hatred and incitement daily, such as this weekly feature: “Mohammed said in his Hadith: The Day of Resurrection will not arrive until you fight the Jews, until a Jew will hide behind a tree and the plant will say, ‘Oh Muslim, servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him!’”

The message is that the murder of Jews is a religious obligation. Moslem clerics repeat this theme in their Friday sermons praising Shahada (suicide bombers cum martyrs). The continued glorification of Shahada is yet another cynical perversion of semantics to free the victims of any sympathy and reinterpret murder as admirable, heroic and the fulfillment of Islamic faith. This past summer Hizbolla demonstrated what it could do when it had the might, the determination and the requisite ruthlessness.

Hence the methodology employed by Palestinian and Hizbolla indoctrinators does not resonate with historical familiarity; it shouts from the housetops.

When Germany was losing on two fronts it removed troops from battle to assist in the murder of Jews. In July of 1944 Germany needed every rail car to begin its evacuation of Greece and send reinforcements to southern Russia. Yet not a single train was diverted from the extermination camp deportations. Unemployment is widespread in the Palestinian Authority and hunger is prevalent. Resources that could be used to alleviate the situation are diverted to the purchase of rockets that are fired upon innocent Israeli citizens.

Kritallnacht did not serve as a wake-up call 68 years ago to a world that was tolerant and uncomprehending of hatred; perhaps it will today. The message is crystal clear.

Read the whole thing.

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 11:38 PM